Imagine creating an affordable product and a sustainable industry tailored to both meet urgent demand and use native materials. This is what the Bamboo Bike Project (BBP) is doing in Kumasi, Ghana. We’ve honed our bamboo bike design to be suitable for road conditions in sub-Saharan Africa, and created a system by which these bikes can be produced in local conditions in Africa with local directions and local labor. Now we’re moving onto the next step, a production run in Africa’s first-ever Bamboo Bike Project facility!
Since being founded in 2007 with seed funding from the Earth Institute, the BBP has worked to make feasible the production of bamboo bikes in Africa. Now we are working with the Earth Institute’s Millennium Cities Initiative (MCI) in an effort to scale up from a feasibility project to routine production. This partnership has paid off: With the help of MCI, bamboo bikes have gained attention from investors and prospective buyers. Our presence in Kumasi, Ghana came about when a local investor native to this Millennium City approached us and shared his interest in establishing a bamboo bike production facility. The investor has already leased a production facility and has reached agreements to harvest local bamboo. The MCI and BBP have also engaged in discussions with interested investors in Kenya, as well as a number of prospective buyers, including NGOs based in Africa and the United States.
In light of this exciting news, MCI announced the release of a new MCI webpage and slideshow about the BBP. The website and slideshow reiterate why bikes are so essential in sub-Saharan Africa—they help transport people to jobs, bring students to schools, carry goods to market, transport agricultural necessities to farms, and deliver medical supplies to hospitals. The MCI materials also highlight the advantages of using bamboo to build bikes, as well as the project’s progress to date.
Thus far, our work has shown that bamboo bikes offer a number of advantages over the imported metal bikes currently used in sub-Saharan Africa. Manufacturing bamboo bike frames requires less electricity and expensive infrastructure, and the final product is lighter, stronger and is better suited for travel on the unpaved roads often found in parts of sub-Saharan Africa. They can also be easily modified for different manufacturer or user needs, such as carrying loads or passengers. Most importantly, the bikes are very affordable. KPMG, an Earth Institute partner, analyzed the feasibility of bamboo bicycle production in Ghana and found that our bikes can be produced for less than $50. This means that they can be sold for significantly less than the current market price of bikes imported from China and India.
In order to maximize the impact of these bikes, the BBP needs additional support from potential investors and donors. Large-scale production will ultimately help deliver a sustainable and affordable form of transportation to rural African populations, while also creating employment opportunities. Accordingly, BBP and MCI have developed a 2-page “prospectus” for prospective donors and investors that outlines the project’s statement of need as well as the potential benefits available to investors.
For more information about this exciting progress, please contact the Bamboo Bike Project at john@bamboobike.org, or the Millennium Cities Initiative at mci@ei.columbia.edu, or visit the websites for the Bamboo Bike Project and MCI.
hello, As a kiwi with number eight psychology and 28 years working in steel fabrication I feel I would have a lot to offer this project and would like to offer my services
is your project affiliated with ‘bamboosero’? they’ve been making great bamboo bikes in zambia for years. they have a cargo model which is handy. what’s nice is that they are also marketing their frames to the USA and europe which brings badly needed foreign capital to the local economy.
http://www.bamboosero.com/about-bamboosero.html
A while back we worked with Craig Calfee to see if we could collaborate on the objectives of the Bamboo Bike Project. We are very much focused on getting bikes made in significant numbers in Africa for Africans. There is a huge need in the continent of Africa itself. We want our business to be a fully African business run by Africans for Africans to meet the needs of the poor people there. If we can achieve that we may consider selling to the US and European market as well like Calfee is doing as that could help the African effort.
But our sights are on the needs in the local market right now.
Thanks for the comment. We appreciate the interest.
John and David for the Bamboo Bike Project.
hello I feel it would be more beneficial to make the wheels from bamboo also with a rubber outer tread as normal wheels
I will soon be trying this in size 12 and 14 wheels
Bamboo wheels used to be ver=y popular especially for track bikes but there are two issues — one is that they are very difficult to build and the other is that we think they would not be strong enough to deal with the harsh conditions in Africa.
Good luck with your experiments. John
thanks for your reply, I agree they are hard to build but cheap and I think building a bike although looks good is very expensive for Africa where as a design such as the sledges similar as those used in Antarctica but with wheels would be more useful and piratical as well as affordable, but I am not sure if there is any intention of charging african’ for the bikes?
thanks rob..
I thing you have a good project here, but I thing bamboo is not a suitable material. Why you do not build a small manufacturing plant where you can build a normal bikes. You can import some of the parts…
Have you done any research as to whether the locals will want to buy the locally made, ecologically friendly, bamboo bike instead of an imported, shiny, Chinese bike if all costs are the same?